


not my cure

by 100demons



Series: from blossoms [2]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Recreational Drug Use, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Unhealthy Relationships, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-21
Updated: 2014-07-21
Packaged: 2018-02-09 18:12:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1992783
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/100demons/pseuds/100demons
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Hey, Jean</i>, the dead Marco says and turns his head, with Kurt’s jaw and Kurt’s crooked smile playing over his lips. </p><p>Jean chokes on the whisky and slams the shot glass down on the countertop. <i>Captain</i>, Marco salutes, with Kurt’s dark curling hair and freckles trailing down the curve of his milky white throat. <i>Captain, Captain</i>...</p>
            </blockquote>





	not my cure

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Island_of_Reil](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Island_of_Reil/gifts).



> For Island_of_Reil, who wondered about Jean/Kurt.
> 
> (warnings: some dub consent ahead considering both parties are under the influence and not quite in their right state of mind, and the use of derogatory slurs against the disabled.)

you are not my doctor  
you are not my cure,

nobody has that  
power, you are merely a fellow traveller

 _Is/Not_  
Margaret Atwood

 

* * *

 

It’s only a bit of gilded copper fastened onto his collar, but Kurt can’t help drawing his thumb over the burnished edge of the bars. _His_ bars.

“Congratulations, Lieutenant Bodt.”

Kurt starts a little, jerking his hand away from his jacket. “I--”

Jean gives him a crooked smile, leaning against the doorjamb with his arms crossed over his chest, hair curling at the nape of his throat, too long and in dire need of a cut. “Looks like someone’s done a bit of growing up while I was away.”

“Captain Kirschstein!” Kurt fairly leaps across the room and is seconds away from gathering him in a bear hug before a sharp twist of Jean’s mouth stops him.

“Sorry,” he says, apologetic, and up close Kurt can see the faint pain lines engraved around his mouth and chiseled deep in his brow. A well-worn cane lies idly in the shadows, just to his side.

“What happened?”

Jean gives him an amused look, suddenly making him feel all of ten with awkward gangly knees and elbows. “A Titan thought I might make for a nice evening snack. I disagreed.”

“Are you on medical leave?” Kurt hovers hesitantly around him, not knowing quite what to do with himself.

“Hm,” Jean says vaguely and reaches up to clap him on his shoulder. “I’m very proud of you. Lieutenant at twenty! I managed to get some clerkboy to print me up a copy of the reports from the Southern Forest expedition, but I want to hear it all from you.”

“Over dinner, of course,” Kurt says, a little wry. “Is this just another ploy to wring free food and booze out of me, Captain?”

Jean gives him a dangerous smile, grip tightening on Kurt’s shoulder.

“Ow, ow! The Lady Rosalie for dinner it is.”

“Good boy,” Jean says, with deep satisfaction. “Now, help me unstick myself from this position, I’ve been standing here for ages waiting for you to come out of Armin’s damn office and I’ve gotten all stiff.”

Kurt obliges with a firm hand and grabbed his elbow with one hand, handing him the cane with the other. Joints pop and crackle in a cacophonous symphony as Jean groaned and bent his broken body into submission.

“That doesn’t sound good,” Kurt observes.

Jean peevishly sets his cane down on Kurt’s toes.

Kurt wisely keeps his mouth shut as they make their way down the stairs to the ground floor, one hand on the small of his back and the other gripping the side rail. After what seems like an eternity, they make it down to the end, the back of Jean’s neck shiny with sweat. His face is drawn tight and winter pale.

“I’ll go grab a cab,” Kurt says hastily and sets him down carefully on a chair by the wall.

“Perfectly capable of walking there,” Jean mutters, voice strained.

“And get mud all over my dress boots?” Kurt makes a face. “Do you know how much polish I used to get them this nice? No way I’m walking in the mud out there with no care like _some_ officers.”

“I liked it better when you were too scared of me to be a smartass,” Jean says sourly, but there’s hardly any bite to it.

Kurt gives him a slightly impudent salute and trots over to the main door, nearly colliding with a harried looking girl with roses entwined on her back and mail-stuffed sacks hanging over both shoulders. He swings around just in time, but a few scraps of paper flutter to the ground, wings tipped with the seal of the Garrison Commander.

“Watch your step,” she snaps at him, hiking the leather straps of her bags back up with a nasty scowl.

Kurt carefully picks up the scattered missives and straightens slowly, taking care not to crease the parchment. He opens his mouth to say something properly reproving, but all the breath in his chest disappears in one fragile moment, stolen by the sweep of Jean’s dark hair falling over his pale forehead, the soft comma of his bent back, elbows leaning heavily on his thighs and hands clasped over the handle of his cane.

His eyes are closed, ringed by dark circles and edged with lines from laughter or pain-- Kurt can’t quite tell which. In this quiet moment, Jean looks as if the entire weight of the Corps sits upon his broad shoulders, old and weary and alone but for the company of shadows.

“Who’s the old geezer?”

Kurt draws in a ragged breath and looks down blindly at the papers crumpled in his fist.

“You okay?” The courier girl inches a little closer, then visibly flinches when she catches sight of his bars pinned to his collar. “No disrespect meant, sir!”

Kurt uncurls his fingers and smooths the paper with trembling hands. A sticky remnant of wax clings to the tips of his fingers.

“That old geezer,” he says in a quiet voice, offering the slightly rumpled papers in an open hand, “is my Captain.”

 

* * *

 

Tucked away in a secluded booth, Jean finally relaxes enough to take off his worn leather jacket, with his battered Captain’s tabs pinned to the collar. Underneath, he’d only bothered to wear a gray knit sweater and black trousers with old non-regulation boots.

Something cold and hard thunks down on the scarred wooden table, amber liquid splashing down over the edges of the tall frosted glass.

Jean picks it up, moving slowly so that his ribs don’t protest as loudly and sniffs it a little warily. It smells sweet and entirely non-alcoholic. “The hell is this?”

“Cider,” Kurt says, cheerfully raising his foam topped glass and smacking his lips in delight.

“Bodt,” Jean says, giving Kurt a thin-lipped smile. “Why the hell did you get me fucking kiddie juice?”

Kurt manages to look mostly innocent. “It’s filled with vitamins, sir. Very nutritious.”

Jean snorts and takes a sip anyway. It’s actually quite good but he doesn’t want to give the damn kid the satisfaction and pretends to choke it down manfully. “Vitamins,” he mutters grouchily. “Sasha’s been brainwashing you with that nonsense.”

“And, well--” Kurt lowers his glass down on the table and there’s a look on his face that Jean can’t get a read on. “Because of well, you know,” Kurt says, waving vaguely at Jean.

“I don’t know--” Jean looks down and stops suddenly, gaze arrested by the fucking cane sitting by his knee. “Oh,” he says, voice flat.

“You’re alright, aren’t you?” Kurt says, looking a little anxious.

Jean takes another long pull from his glass and very carefully avoids answering. Instead of dulling the sharp edge of his thoughts, the cider just slides down his throat, nice and easy, settling in his stomach with none of the wrenching fire that he needs.

“Tell me what happened,” Jean says abruptly, putting on a keen smile that cuts the skin of his lips. “About the expedition you just got back from, with your fancy new bars.”

Kurt looks doubtful and entirely too knowing, but he obeys anyway, words spilling from his mouth eagerly as he describes his last hair-raising venture in the Southern Forests. Jean loses himself in the conversation, only vaguely following along with the thread of the story; he makes all the right murmurs and nods at all the right times, but his eyes track the soft shadows dappling the smooth hollow of Kurt’s throat, the curve of his jaw, the bright light dancing in Marco’s brown eyes.

“Sir?”

Jean tears his gaze from Kurt’s hands and blinks a little. “Sorry, I was distracted for a second. You were talking about the retreat--?”

Kurt goes very quiet. “That was ten minutes ago, Captain. I’ve been asking you if you’d like another drink or not, sir.”

Jean looks down blankly at his suddenly empty glass.

“You’re not alright, are you?”

He pushes the glass away in a sudden, violent motion. The glass teeters one one edge before toppling over, a hairline crack spidering through the side. Kurt never moves.

Jean rubs his face, feeling tired and so very old. “Got a nasty chunk taken out of my leg last week on a patrol and it took too long to get back in time. Ended up with a bad case of gangrene. They had to operate.” His throat feels as dry as sandpaper, every word he speaks scraping the sides raw and bloody. “I’m stuck with the cane for the rest of my life.”

Kurt sucks in a harsh breath. “You can’t mean--?”

“Honorable medical discharge,” Jean says in a distant voice. “Or I ride a desk with a cane like a fucking crip.” He laughs, harsh as a crow’s mocking caw. “Not like,” he corrects himself. “I _am_ a crip now.”

“Sir--!”

Jean shakes his head. “Look at me raining on your parade. We’re supposed to be out celebrating your damn promotion, Lieutenant. Today is your day.”

“It’s your day as much as it’s mine,” Kurt says, fierce. “I never would have made it this far without you. I would have died on my first patrol outside if you hadn’t saved my sorry ass. My bars are as much mine as they are yours.”

Jean swallows. “Kid--”

Kurt gives him a crooked smile. “Sir.”

Jean is too fucking sober to be facing any of this, but especially the look in Kurt’s eyes and the careful way he threads his fingers together.

“What now?” Kurt asks as he looks down at his hands, choosing his words with care.

Jean leans back in his booth, the back of his head hitting the wall with a solid thunk. The pain feels good against the constant throbbing ache in his leg and chest. “I don’t know,” he says honestly.

“Have you talked to Commander Arlet about any of this?”

“No point,” Jean shrugs. “Armin can’t do shit about a decision made by the Medical Corps.”

“You’re not avoiding him, are you?”

Jean stiffens. “No,” he says, just a touch sharp.

“Ah,” Kurt says.

“You,” Jean informs him, “are a little shit and also my subordinate. The order of the day is that we get spectacularly drunk and put off all this important thinking for another day.”

“But sir--”

Jean ignores him and clambers up on top of the table, gritting his teeth when his left leg staggers underneath his weight. He puts one hand on the wall for support and cups the other around his mouth. “Hey, assholes!”

Almost as one, the entire bar turns around to look at him, growing silent with a murderous edge.

“This little piece of shit here--” Jean points down at an increasingly mortified Kurt. “Just got promoted to Lieutenant. All drinks are on him for the next round!”

The packed room roars in approval and a mob of enlisted men swarm the table, bearing beers and goodwill. One Legion man slaps Kurt so hard on the back he nearly bends in half, coughing into his glass.

Satisfied, Jean clambers down, accidentally on purpose booting several men in the back, and retrieves his cane and jacket from the mass of swarming bodies that was once their table.

“Captain!” Kurt chokes out, looking more than a little deranged in the circle of toasts and chest pounding.

Jean waves back cheerfully and limps over to the bar, summoning a bartender with a flick of his fingers. The bartender, noticing the tabs on his collar and the look in his eye, slides right over with a towel draped over his shoulder.

“What will you have, sir?” The man touches his fist to his heart in a quiet salute. Jean squints a little, and makes out the faint glint of silver wings on the man’s shirt.

“Get me a bottle of the good whisky,” Jean says, tapping his knuckles on the granite countertop. “And a glass.”

The bartender pulls out a dusty old bottle and a shot glass he wipes with the towel over his shoulder. “There you go, sir.”

Jean slides over a wad of notes and waves the change away. “Keep it. I might not be conscious enough to tip later.”

The bartender gives him a look.

“What, you can’t take a joke?” Jean grins, the edge of it sharp enough to cut through steel. “I’ve got some time off for the first time in a while. Might as well spend it drinking the good stuff.”

Jean slides onto the stool, deliberately setting his back to the circus going on behind him. Kid’s all grown up and killing Titans and shooting up the ranks. Jean pours himself a glass, only spilling a little. He clenches his trembling hands tight around the thick glass.

He tries to think of Marco in honor of the occasion but there’s only the blurry impression of a smile and a shoulder around his arms. Even the tags around his right ankle have lost their weight. He knocks back the drink and revels in this cold fire burning down his throat, at the way it blunts the hard angles of his mind. He loses track of how many times he pours one out, fingers slick with sweat and the acrid smell of hard booze.

“Cheers,” he toasts his ghosts, voice bitter. He tries again to bring up a vague memory of the two of them sitting in class, Marco biting on the tip of of his fountain pen, brow furrowed in deep concentration.

 _Hey, Jean_ , the dead Marco says and turns his head, with Kurt’s jaw and Kurt’s crooked smile playing over his lips.

Jean chokes on the whisky and slams the shot glass down on the countertop. _Captain_ , Marco salutes, with Kurt’s dark curling hair and freckles trailing down the curve of his milky white throat. _Captain, Captain_...

“Captain, are you alright?!” A fist pounds his back and Jean tries to wave it away, half-blinded by tears and stray drops of alcohol.

“Captain Kirschstein!”

He wheezes one last time, just stopping short of gagging. Jean rubs his eyes with the back of his sweater sleeve and peers blearily at the face just inches away from him.

“Jean!”

“Marco,” Jean laughs with tears streaming down his face, and claps his ghost’s shoulder tightly. “You fucking son of a bitch.”

“Captain, it’s--” Marco’s face blurs a little and Jean dashes more tears away. “It’s me.”

“You fucker,” Jean gasps, the laughter dying away to reveal the aching hole in his chest. “I thought I would be done with you by now. You’re dead and he’s not. Leave the living alone.”

Marco bends down, picking up the nearly empty bottle of whisky on the countertop. “You had this all?” he says, marveling.

“Maybe I can pick up a second career as a penniless drunk,” Jean slurs, a ghastly smile on his face that rends his face from corner to corner. “We make a funny pair. A dead boy and an alcoholic ex-soldier, sitting at a bar, passing the time.”

“Jean,” Marco says, sliding in the seat next to him, face so white that his freckles look almost black in contrast. “I-- I--”

“Shh,” Jean murmurs and leans in until he can see a reflection of himself in miniature in Marco’s pale brown eyes, close enough that he can draw constellations of the freckles scattered across Marco’s smooth skin.

“I’m not who you think I am,” Marco says, his warm breath washing over Jean, smelling of cheap beer and late night regrets.

“Let me pretend for a little longer,” Jean whispers back.

Kurt meets him halfway and presses his mouth against his Captain’s, lips parting as he shudders in mixed pain and pleasure. Jean’s hand cradles the back of Kurt’s neck, tenderly, as he sucks Kurt’s bottom lip.

“Bodt,” Jean moans as Kurt breaks the kiss to nip at Jean’s jaw, shadowed with stubble.

Clumsy fingers tug at the hem of his sweater; Jean lurches back a little in his seat and Kurt follows, mouth pressed against the staccato thrum of Jean’s heartbeat.

“Captain, my Captain,” Kurt murmurs in soft tones, as if in prayer.

Jean holds him tight, fingertips digging into skin hard enough to leave bruises. “Stay with me, Marco,” he pleads, pressing his mouth against those soft dark curls.

Kurt bows his head, eyes shadowed. “I promise.”


End file.
